Pretty Birds by Scott Simon Page A

Communism—the big
ism
s learned their lessons in those petite shit holes. They’ll let the little brats of the world make their point, then clean up their mess. That’s why Kuwait, Panama, Haiti were short wars. War burns money. For each bomb you see, imagine a million dollars in cinders. For each body you see—and, I beg your pardon, I am thinking of your mother, too—imagine someone who can’t buy a thousand more Cokes. Losses add up. The West might let killing creep on in Ethiopia or Somalia. People there don’t have two rubles to rub together for a Coke.” Mrs. Julianovic slapped her hands against her wrists for emphasis. “But
they’re
in the Dark Ages.
We
are in
Europe.
We have Benettons here on Vase Miskina Street. Richard Branson sells music next door. Forget that human life is priceless. Consumers’ lives have
market value.
In the end, it’s a better guarantee. My motto: you can’t sell Volvos to dead people.”
    Mr. Zaric was a moment realizing that it was his turn. “Still,” he said. “Milosevic, Karadzic. They seem explicit about wanting this Greater Serbia. There wouldn’t seem to be room for good old mixed-up Bosnia in there.”
    â€œAh, the bastards,” Mrs. Julianovic said. “Please pardon my French. Slobodan Milosevic’s game is Kosovo. I suppose he has promised it to his teenage Russian mistress. She would probably prefer another platinum Cartier, although I am told there is display room remaining only on her right ankle. The Holy Grail of the Serb nation resides in Kosovo. He who reverses the disgrace of that defeat, so many centuries ago, lays claim to the Serb kingdom. Milosevic is content to keep Bosnia in his basement. But he doesn’t want Karadzic’s self-proclaimed Bosnian Serb kingdom in his gut. Karadzic, that overweight silver worm, wants to brandish the jewel of Sarajevo in his navel, to rival Milosevic. How can Slobo sit easy on his throne if Karadzic is looking for a chance to steal his velvet slippers? So in the end,” said Aleksandra Julianovic, as if presenting the final course of a holiday dinner, “we won’t have to lift a finger. I am old and have seen a lot here, as did Gita. The Blue Helmets and the Iron Chump will shut this mess down and we can pick up our lives. I am wondering,” she said, “if I want to chance it downstairs in the dark to see if I can find some candy.”
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    GRANDMA’S APARTMENT HAD two bedrooms. But the Zarics chose to spend the night on the floor of the living room. Each took a space along the wall, just below the front windows. They reasoned, on the basis of recent experience that was incomplete but compelling, that any sniper shots or mortars fired through the glass would zing past their heads. Irena lay under her German army jacket, her spine flat against the floor, Pretty Bird quiet by her head. They said good night. Whatever they said to one another, it was at least one thing more than what Irena could remember of the day.
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    AND SHE SLEPT. Irena was an athlete. Just as she knew that she could rely on her training to bestow speed and strength on demand, she knew that she could now count on her body to grant her sleep.

7.
    IT WAS SEVERAL weeks before most of the rest of the city decided that the war had begun. It seemed safer to believe that some kind of madness was moving through, like a sudden, blinding snowstorm. No one could stop it; no one could be blamed for it. But at some point it would melt away. You could come up out of the cellar and find all the comforting artifacts of your life set up in your living room.
    Yet within just a few days Irena and her family had made critical adjustments. Some of them were more or less instantaneous and, once done, more obvious than amazing. Irena was surprised to hear that Bruce Springsteen had left Julianne Phillips, or that